Vaile doubts bush services can be protected

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Deputy Nationals leader Mark Vaile has raised doubts about a
government plan to ensure bush phone services keep pace with those
in metropolitan centres.

Vaile, the trade minister, said it would be difficult to have a
set review of rural telecommunications services that ensured
country people were not left behind.

And he also suggested the structural separation of Telstra be
examined to ensure there was competition in country areas to keep
downward pressure on prices.

Last week Telecommunications Minister Helen Coonan unveiled
plans to create a special panel that would review country phone and
internet services every five years under a privatised Telstra.

But there are concerns within the Nationals that five years is
far too long because of the pace of technological improvement
within the telecommunications sector.

Vaile said the government had to come up with a system that gave
country people confidence they were not left behind as technology
improved.

"I don't know if we can actually proscribe accurately how we're
going to best future-proof telecommunications services into
regional Australia," he told reporters.

"The underpinning point in all of this still remains we've got
to ensure the services are up to scratch in terms of people in
rural and regional Australia, and then devise a mechanism if you
like that will give comfort to consumers right across Australia,
but particularly in remote parts of Australia, about the ongoing
delivery of services."

Nationals leader John Anderson last week said a growing issue
was the provision of competition in country areas, especially for
internet services.

Vaile said structural separation was one area worth
examining.

"It's been suggested by some different parties, and I think that
any of those suggestions we just should not discount out of hand,"
he said.

"We should have long hard look at what form they might take in
the future, and certainly whether or not it might help better
provide that comfort in terms of consumers in the delivery of not
just services, but at competitive rates."

Vaile said competitive pressures in rural and regional areas
would be vital for consumers.

"We also in this whole process have got to ensure that there's a
level of competition in the marketplace that provides consumers
with comfort, that they think they're getting competitively priced
service delivery," he said.